With his thirtieth birthday looming in July, Barry Sutherland reckoned it was time for a change of direction. So, after several years of unprecedented success with Scotland's top club, Newlands, he will be dropping down to play for the Scottish league division two side, Whitecraigs, next season.
It's not that the internationalist reckons he is over the hill. But he has just taken up a post as club manager at the Whitecraigs Tennis and Squash Club, and building up the squash side will be a priority.
Sutherland, who spent his early career playing and coaching in Spain, had five years as the Newlands No1. During that time, the Glasgow club had an unbroken reign as Scottish League champions and won three Scottish Cups.
This year, they lost to Bridge of Allan in a Cup final that was Sutherland's final match. ''It was a disappointing way to finish,'' he reflected. ''But I won my tie and we only lost on a points countback.''
He took up the new post at the start of this month, and continued: ''It is a great new challenge. One of my aims is to introduce fitness classes and try to encourage more families to get involved in tennis and squash at the club.
''I'll be playing for the club in the West of Scotland league and the Scottish National division two. It would be nice if we could win promotion.''
Sutherland played for Scotland in both European and World championships, but concedes that his international days may now be over. ''I had already cut back this year and unless you are a full-time professional it is difficult to compete at the highest level.
''This was too good an opportunity to miss, and now I'm looking forward to the start of a new career.''
Following his appointment, Sutherland has had to relinquish his post as West of Scotland's squash development officer. In fact, three of the five posts are currently vacant. Eric Burey (Lothian) recently resigned and Simon Boughton (Central) has taken up a new club appointment with Edinburgh Sports Club.
However, Mark Beaumont will be continuing his good work in the Tayside region. He has just been named Scotland's squash coach of the year.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article